Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The question is sufficient.

Eric Forth: Will the Chancellor be boasting, as he has just done today, to his fellow Finance Ministers about how wonderfully well we are doing and, by implication, how badly they are all doing? In that context, what will he say to the French Finance Minister about the scandal now taking place in France? The French are advancing protectionism, which is completely in conflict with the so-called Lisbon agreement.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The Chancellor has had at least three strikes outside the sphere of the question. I must ask him to confine his answer to the question that has been asked.

Mark Francois: The Paymaster General pointedly refused to answer the question about the cost of the 10-fold increase in the income disregard, but when senior officials in Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs gave evidence to the Public Accounts Committee on 14 December, they admitted that that separate figure had been calculated, and offered to provide it to PAC
	"in liaison with our Treasury colleagues".
	However, that liaison has been going on for two and a half months and has not come to a conclusion. As Ministers obviously have a figure for what the income disregard will cost, when will they share it with the House and the British taxpayer, so that we know how much that very major element of the Chancellor's pet project will really cost?

Julian Lewis: When the Leader of the House concedes a debate on the threat to thousands of post offices—as I am sure that he will, given the non-partisan way in which he exercises his office—will he frame its terms broadly enough to include a discussion of the closure of thousands of bank branches? That will enable us to raise the concern of our constituents that 20 per cent. of all bank branches have closed in the past 10 years, and that the promise not to close the last branch in town is being systematically undermined by the stretching of that commitment if, for example, there is branch in another village four miles away.

Beverley Hughes: That is not the case. Much of the money that I mentioned is going to local level. Contact centres for supervised access that are run and managed by voluntary agencies have a great role to play. It is not the case that that money is simply for Government or local authority-run centres. By and large, they are run in partnership with voluntary agencies. We want that to continue because they have great expertise. Many parents find the concept of supervised contact undertaken by a voluntary agency more palatable than the concept of supervised contact at a centre run by a local authority or by the Government.

Beverley Hughes: The court will consider all the circumstances of each case. If a compensation order for a certain amount of money is made, the court will take account of the ability of the non-resident parent, in the case set out by the hon. Gentleman, to pay the money. The court will put the arrangements in the compensation order. If the money is subsequently paid, the court will reconsider the matter and decide what action to take. It will look at all the circumstances in the round, including whether the contact order has subsequently been complied with in full. The details of each case are for the court to decide.
	The provisions in this part of the Bill have been asked for by the courts. They want the flexibility that will allow them to act against those who breach contact orders, without having a disproportionate effect on the child. We all understand how important that is. When they make contact orders, the courts have a single guiding principle in mind—that the welfare of the child is paramount. That principle is set out in section 1 of the Children Act 1989. It underpins all our policy and is the foundation of this Bill.

Tim Loughton: The right hon. Lady needs to speak to her colleague in the upper House, Baroness Scotland, because, on 16 November, the day after consideration of Report in that House, she said in response to one of my noble Friends that a presumption "is only a presumption." That answers the Ministers question. That does not fetter the courts. The issue is up for interpretation and a presumption is only a presumption.
	The system that we are talking about is best served if we can avoid reaching a certain stage by means of prevention. The best solution to acrimonious legal disputes is to prevent them coming to court in the first place. We favour concentrating more on preventive action, which keeps families together. We need to see much more work undertaken by properly resourced professionally trained social workers, who spend more time not fire fighting if something goes wrong, but more time on preventive action to keep families together in the first place rather than pulling them apart. For example, Kent has done some excellent work in that regard. That is one reason why the number of children in care in Kent has fallen dramatically.
	We need also to achieve an agreed settlement earlier. As my noble. Friend Earl Howe said in the other Chamber, there is a simple truth associated with contact disputes: if both parties to the dispute are content with the amount of contact that they have with the child, there is no longer any dispute. We must also agree to some form of mediation. We will have further debates about the extent to which that mediation should be imposed on, or agreed with, the parties.
	The Government initiated the promising form of mediation in what was called the early interventions project in the autumn of 2003. It was a successful and imaginative project. The prototype was due to be up and running by 2004, with a national roll-out by 2005. The aim was to defuse parental battles and dramatically to reduce the number of court cases. The project was mysteriously abandoned and replaced with the ill-thought-through family resolutions pilot project, which has been mentioned, having been scuppered by the Department of Education and Skills. Perhaps the Minister can give us more detail on that, though that happened under her predecessor.
	The family resolutions project, which ran for one year from September 2004 to 2005, with three pilots in London, Birmingham and Brighton, cost more than £300,000. Thousands of couples were expected to come through the process but only 47 couples started the process and only 23 of them finished it. We have already heard about that independent evaluation.
	As The Guardian put it, that project was a waste of time. That was a great shame because it replaced something that was rather more worth while. We need to set up an expectation that mediation will be used to try to get things sorted before they come to court. We think that it should be close to mandatory for parents to embark on mediation processes before they come to court, and that if they refuse to take up the offer, that should go on their record. Hence my intervention earlier about differentiating between a partner who is perfectly happy to go along with the mediation process and the other party who decides that they will not have anything to do with it, with the result that both parties are subjected to court proceedings. Surely that must count against somebody who had refused unreasonably the mediation process and count more favourably to the person who was prepared to go along with it.
	We want the early interventions project to be restored—it should be given a fair chance. That confidential mediation process would be privileged and could not be cited in subsequent court proceedings. However, there are question marks over the limited financial incentives for divorcing parents in opting for mediation. We are also concerned about the availability of people who are skilled in mediation within the Courts Service. There are many examples of where a more compelled mediation service has brought about dramatic results, particularly in Virginia where mediation has shown that after 12 years 30 per cent. of parents who had attended mediation were in weekly contact with their children as against only 7 per cent. who had been through litigation and had shunned mediation. This shows that mediation does work.

Annette Brooke: I understand that if both parents are on legal aid mediation will be free, but I am not sure what happens when, for example, one parent is on legal aid and the other is not. I hope that the Minister will address the issue. Certainly we should consider it in Committee.
	The 10 per cent. of cases that reach the courts are those in which people need the most support and problem-solving. It may seem a small percentage, but in terms of numbers it represents a large tragedy. Each year there are 40,000 applications to the courts over child contact, and 70,000 breaches of child contact orders. That should concern us greatly.
	The consultation document issued by CAFCASS, "Every Day Matters", makes some good points about intervention. CAFCASS frequently intervenes too late, long after parents' attitudes to each other have hardened, or long after one parent has created a new household excluding his or her former partner. Indeed, many attitudes have hardened long before the first court application—hence the need for even earlier intervention where possible. Arguments about the fine detail of contact arrangements occupy huge amounts of scarce professional time, often unproductively. Once a court application is made, there is a clear risk of an adversarial model of law being started. The consultation document illustrates why we must put such emphasis on early intervention. However, we must also make information easily accessible. The Minister mentioned the telephone helpline. I understand that booklets are available, but I wonder whether they are necessarily the best format for those who need to access information. I would like to know exactly what is available for parents at the moment and whether, for example, videos as well as printed leaflets are available.
	Research by the university of East Anglia and other research indicate that many of the parents among the 10 per cent. that go to court are very young, poorly educated and on low incomes with extremely young children. Partly because of their lack of education, they often find it difficult to communicate not only with each other, but with those who try to help them. There may be a deep lack of trust between the parents, a history of violence, or poor parenting skills. Parenting skills play an important part in preventing such situations from becoming adversarial, which is when worries arise about the vulnerability of the children.
	We agree with the Government—I have done quite a bit of that so far—that mediation cannot be made compulsory. One can put two people in a room with someone but, if they are not prepared to participate, one cannot make it work. However, we support the case for a compulsory referral meeting about mediation. We think that that is where the compulsion should take place. We argue that that meeting should be free, as we do not think that we can compel people to do something and then charge for it. I qualify that by saying that any meeting would need to take account of the principle that the welfare of the child is paramount.

Annette Brooke: That is my point. The Select Committee concluded that inserting a statement into the welfare checklist offered a possible solution and did not have the dangers associated with having two legal presumptions. It also said that the court should have regard—and this is the critical point—to the importance of sustaining a relationship between children and non-resident parents.
	That approach was also endorsed by the Scrutiny Committee. I know that the Government heard that request, and I hope that the Minister will say whether there will be any response to it.We have been told again today, as we have been told repeatedly, that the assumption of reasonable contact is established in case law, but we should try to find appropriate wording—perhaps in the form of something added to the welfare checklist—to give some clarity and guidance.
	With reference to the point raised by the hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs. Miller), what amounts almost to a self-generating bias has been caused by the delays that occurred in the past. It is clear that a resolution is even harder to achieve if a non-resident parent has not had contact with a child for six months or longer. In such cases, the outcome is almost a self-fulfilling prophecy. What can we do? Is it a question only of making the court process more efficient, or can we put in place some mechanism to deal with the problem, where there is no risk of harm? I hope to be able to explore that in greater detail in Committee.
	The hon. Member for Luton, South said that it is vital that the views of children are fully considered. My impression is that, in good circumstances, CAFCASS does take account of children's views and deals with them very well. It would be interesting to have some evidence in that regard, but hearsay suggests that that body's response is patchy across the country. I support the NSPCC's contention that the Bill fails to make any provision in respect of the mechanism by which the courts may ascertain the child's wishes and feelings, or ensure that separate representation for the child is available when that child might be at risk and his or her interests are in conflict with those of the parents.
	Section 122 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 has been mentioned already. I have tabled some parliamentary questions on the matter, but it would be very helpful if the Minister who winds up the debate is able to say whether the provision is likely to be implemented in the near future. A great deal of research exists to suggest that taking a child's wishes and feelings into account can lead to better resolution between parents. We must find the best practice in that respect, but I am sure that all hon. Members want that outcome.
	Much has been said in the debate about enforcement, although I have not devoted as much of my speech to the topic as the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham did. It is important to consider different penalties, and my earlier intervention was aimed simply at establishing whether a range of penalties existed. The community punishment is obviously preferable to sending a parent to prison, which is a last resort, but the way that it is operated by the probation service means that some parents will find it difficult to make sure that the child's interests are not affected. For example, a parent who is sent on a gardening scheme might have to wear a very visible jacket, and her child might think, "That's my mother doing that."
	I am not convinced that the community punishment work would be appropriate in all cases. Will the Minister say whether the provisions in the earlier part of the Bill could be applied as part of a contact order's enforcement process so that, for instance, a person could be sent off to an appropriate parenting course? That would add to the range of available penalties, although all matters to do with contact activities, community service and so on obviously require adequate resourcing. We know that delays have been caused by CAFCASS, but in "Every Day Matters" it seems almost to be putting on a brave face. It says that it does not have enough resources, but that it has proposed new solutions. We have to be concerned that CAFCASS is adequately resourced.
	I asked a parliamentary question recently and established that while the average training budget per employee was as high as £644 in one year, this year it had slipped down to £390. If we envisage CAFCASS carrying out a much wider range of activities, including risk assessments, training will be all important. We have to get it right. There is a great deal of concern about the potential under-resourcing of CAFCASS when it is taking on a changing role.
	Finally, on part 1, I concur with the Conservative Opposition that increasing transparency where it is safe and appropriate to do so in the family court system will help to address some of the current grievances.
	I shall be rather brief on part 2, not because it is not important, but simply because with the interventions that I have taken I have been speaking for rather a long time. It is absolutely right that we have slightly more focus on adults in this part of the Bill, although safeguarding children is still important. We all know that inter-country adoption happens for different reasons. Frequently, people adopt children from within their extended family or friendship ties. More often than not, such adoptions are nothing like that. There are thousands of children waiting for adoption in this country, but they are older children and they have a number of problems. People choose to go abroad to adopt babies. The proposed legislation will cover countries, I presume, such as the USA. It is not simply about people who, for humanitarian reasons, go abroad to adopt children in need.
	The procedures for suspending adoptions from other countries need to be clear, transparent and fair. I supported the decision to take urgent action on Cambodia when trafficking issues arose. The process of inter-country adoption is extremely long. It is an extensive and expensive process. I have some concerns about the fee issue, which was discussed at length in the other place. I agree with the extension of the time limit from six to 12 months, as proposed in clause 14. It will stop people evading some of the rigours of the adoption procedures in other countries. There is quite a dilemma in terms of time taken and expense, but it is important to get it right. I look forward to debating that fully in Committee.
	Baroness Barker moved an amendment in another place to make it easier in appropriate cases for children to be adopted from the UK to overseas, more often than not by relatives. As promised by the Minister in that debate, a meeting has taken place with civil servants. Does the Minister have any update for us on that today? I understand the difficulties of establishing sufficient safeguards for children, but clearly it is important to look at the issue that way on as well.
	Baroness Barker said in the other place:
	"Until such time as we have a private fostering system that is properly regulated in this country, we will continue to run up against problems that sometimes are masked as inter-country adoptions but more likely are about trafficking."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 29 June 2005; Vol. 673, c. 282.]
	Recently, we have seen reports about the number of children in this country who simply disappear as a result of a badly regulated system of private fostering. I, too, have made my cause the need to make progress to proper regulation of private fostering. That is important.
	All in all, there are some important and useful aspects to the Bill and I look forward to a constructive time in Committee, where everyone will listen to one another and we will come up with a safe solution, while acknowledging that there are issues about how the current system operates.

Stewart Jackson: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for allowing me to participate in this vital debate, which has been marked by good sense, clarity and shared principles, as exemplified by the speech of the hon. Member for Stockport (Ann Coffey), who clearly knows what she is talking about. For the record, I will confine my remarks to part 1, concentrating on contact orders and the operation of family courts. Other hon. Members may wish to debate the more thorny subject of inter-country adoptions.
	I believe that there is a consensus across the House for us to achieve an outcome that is not only practical and pragmatic, but fair and compassionate, with the paramount consideration being the welfare of children, both in theory and practice in statute. I am pleased to say that there is a political will on both sides of the House to put aside party differences and focus on getting the legislation right. We are, of course, dealing not with dry, arcane academic case law, but with people's lives and the future of our children, whose lives may be fractured or broken by the raw emotion and hurt engendered by the disintegration of their families and the growing phenomenon of divorce and separation. As has been mentioned, the trauma and stress of that affects about 200,000 children each year.
	I see that the annunciator says that I am "Nick Herbert, Arundel and South Downs", Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am sure that Hansard will amend that.
	Two thirds of those children are under 10 years of age. As my hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs. Miller) mentioned, 40 per cent. of children lose contact with the non-resident parents, often as the result of bitter and protracted disputes following separation and divorce.
	We agree on much in the Bill. In particular, I welcome the Government's commitment on risk assessments in clause 7, which is supported by hon. Members on both sides of the House. There is a demonstrable need for a more effective method of enforcing contact orders. In so far as Parliament can legislate to change people's lives for the better—as Disraeli may have said in another context, "The elevation of the people"—that is what we are trying to do today. It may not be Catholic emancipation or the abolition of slavery, but we are trying to improve people's lives and to give adults and children a better future, to ameliorate the tragedy of family disintegration.
	We agree that, as legislators, we have a duty and responsibility to balance the best of what has gone before, best practice and an evidence-based analysis of the current system with a realisation that there are significant flaws in what passes for the practice of family law today, which is sometimes perceived as ineffectual and certainly perceived by many people as unfair.
	I welcome much of the Bill. I support the insertion of the domestic violence perpetrator programme into the Bill and the introduction of risk assessments, especially given the points made eloquently by the hon. Member for Luton, South (Margaret Moran) about circumstances where allegations or proof of abuse are involved. It is right to reform the Children Act 1989 and I am glad that there is recognition that the principle of children maintaining contact with both parents after divorce and separation should be enunciated, even though I might think that is not expressed sufficiently robustly in the Bill.
	The recognition that contact orders are meaningless in their practical application without legal sanction is also welcome. Non-compliance cannot and should not be allowed to be tolerated by the courts with impunity. If it is, we risk undermining the whole discharge of family law. The Bill's proposals establish a marker that creates a disincentive for those who would otherwise flout the will of the court. They restore balance to an area hitherto considered wholly biased against the non-resident parent. As has already been said by my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), giving the court a range of options, such as the early intervention projects, is realistic and sensible. Most importantly, it recognises that all families— parents and children—are different and that a one-size-fits-all approach is inappropriate in this particularly sensitive area. It goes without saying that I welcome the fact that Ministers have supported the decision not to proceed with tagging, which would have been a grotesque and gratuitous overreaction.
	The failure—or, if I am being charitable, the non-success—of the family resolution pilots, which were launched and discontinued at a hugely disproportionate cost and which involved low take-up and a lack of compulsion, should not prevent Ministers from being imaginative, especially when reviewing the efficacy of mediation in the package of measures. However, voluntary measures will once again fail. As I mentioned when I intervened on the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke), only a legal obligation enacted by the courts will have the desired effect. Academic evidence from Norway, the United States and other countries has shown that that is the case. I hope that that matter will be debated in Committee at length and in detail.
	The wider range of options available to the courts, the improvement in the monitoring of contact and—I agree with the hon. Member for Stockport—the enactment of family assistance orders are positive steps. The idea of a legal presumption to promote contact has attracted wide support across parties.
	I want to focus on a reasonably small number of areas that concern me and which remain unresolved in the Bill. At the outset I have to say—this may be controversial—that I believe that there is no contradiction between the presumption of co-parenting and the safety of the child or children subject to a contact order. I do not believe that the case has been sufficiently made that a legal presumption is, in general, in any way at odds with the interests of the child or children. I regret that the Government have not sought to strengthen the Children Act 1989 to give legal power to reasonable contact. I will come back to the word "reasonable" later.
	Common sense indicates that children desire successful co-parenting after divorce and separation, and are happier and healthier as a result of it. Those children mostly go on to be settled, responsible and decent adults and to be good parents themselves. That is borne out by research by the National Council for One Parent Families in a study by J. Hunt in 2003.
	We are attempting to establish, where practicable, a strong and loving relationship between a child and both parents. Noble lords and ladies in the other place debated at length—I believe in relation to amendment No. 2—the word "reasonable", which is enshrined in section 34 of the 1989 Act. I would also add "meaningful" as a given. I am glad that the Minister acknowledged in her comments to the Joint Committee the use of the word "meaningful". "Substantial" was mentioned by my colleague, Baroness Morris of Bolton in the other place.
	The positions taken by organisations such as Families Need Fathers and children's charities such as Barnardo's and the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, notwithstanding its ill-judged and intemperate comments in its briefing notes, need not be irreconcilable. The presumption is an instrument that gives flexibility to the courts to tailor their decisions accordingly. Evidence shows that it would only formalise the current situation, where very few contact orders are not granted. That in no way invalidates the paramountcy principle in respect of the welfare and interests of the child.
	A corollary of this practical approach that the Government have not yet fully acknowledged is the strong argument in favour of a greater role for the child's voice to be heard in court, an argument that some Labour Members have advanced. It is one of the issues in the NSPCC briefing paper with which I agree, so it does not get everything wrong. Perhaps the Minister will touch on why section 122 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002, which provides for children to have a legal and discrete right to be participants and to have separate representation in court, remains unimplemented.
	I shall make some tangential comments. There has been consensus but the partisan comments of the hon. and learned Member for Redcar (Vera Baird) obscure the issue. We all want children's voices to be taken into account. If an important piece of legislation has been on the statute book for three years and an important section of it remains unenacted, it is surely reasonable for us to ask why that is so.

Eric Pickles: I am grateful for the opportunity to make a modest contribution to the debate. It is a particular pleasure to follow the hon. and learned Member for Redcar (Vera Baird). I hope she will forgive me if I do not pursue some of her excellent points, as I want to concentrate on a narrower aspect of the Bill, namely adoption. I want to say something about the secrecy of the family court. I think that some of the general rules on adoption concerning foreign nations are relevant to our own system. A particularly sad case in which I have been involved over the last few months has a direct bearing on how adoption works in practice, especially forced adoption, the most extreme of the many issues that we must consider.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Mr. Jackson) described the Under-Secretary of State as sparky. I am not sure that I can follow him down that avenue, but I want to record my enormous appreciation for the courtesy that she has shown me in connection with that case and my concerns about adoption. We have had three formal meetings and many more informal meetings. The Under-Secretary has changed my views on a number of important issues. She has also reinforced some of my prejudices, which is a nice feeling—but I am genuinely grateful to her, and grief-stricken by the fact that she is plainly suffering from a heavy cold. I wish her a quick recovery.
	As I have said, I am concerned about the secrecy of the family court. I tabled an early-day motion on the subject. Looking around the Chamber earlier, I noted that almost every Member present, apart from Ministers and, obviously, the occupant of the Chair, had signed it. Early-day motion 869, entitled "Workings of the Children Act 2004", stated:
	"That this House urges the Government to remove the veil of secrecy from the workings of the Children Act 2004; considers that the closed door policy of the family courts breeds suspicion and a culture of secrecy which does nothing to instil confidence in those using them, which affects not just the courts but the social services departments of local authorities; and believes that it is possible to preserve the anonymity of children involved in the proceedings without the cumbersome rules which obstruct parents from receiving advice and support, which in particular works to the disadvantage of parents with special learning difficulty."
	The hon. and learned Member for Redcar spoke about the concept of the rights of the child being paramount. Her explanation was a good deal clearer than some that I have received from social services departments. However, I am less concerned with the effect on the courts than with the effect on social services. There is almost a process of Chinese whispers, whereby that noble concept becomes bastardised into an unwillingness to disclose, to justify, to listen to arguments, or even to see a need to explain decisions. The law was changed because of Members' difficulties in obtaining information from social services departments. At one time, they were threatened with contempt proceedings and prosecutions for pursuing constituency cases. Since the beginning of April last year, however, we have been able to look at case files and discuss the issues. I may be wrong but I think that I was the first Member of Parliament to take advantage of that, after a constituent who was going through the process brought it to my attention in the early part of April last year.
	The change in the law seems to have wholly passed by Essex social services department. Despite the will of the House and the change in the law, it led me through quite an elaborate dance when I wanted to get some basic information from it. At one point, it insisted that I went to court to get special permission, when by Act of Parliament I already had that right. Had it not been for my noble Friend Lord Hanningfield, who happens to be the leader of Essex county council, I do not think that I would have been able to pursue the case to the full.
	I cannot go into the details of the case, but I can talk about it in the abstract and discuss the way it affects the law. It concerned the decision by Essex social services to remove two children from a family because they considered the mother to be stupid and incapable of bringing up the children because of her lack of intellect. The mother had an IQ of around 60. Social services sought to present her as stupid to the point of being unable to understand maternal feelings. In my view, she was a little slow but someone who clearly loved her two children. She was faced with an unending stream of social workers dealing with her case—at one point, I counted 16—who were pushing her in different directions. She was left bewildered and unable adequately to rebut social services' allegations. I want to say a few things about people with learning difficulties and then move to the general question of social services. I want to stay firmly within the terms of the Bill.
	A problem has been identified recently with the Meadow case. I do not want to go down that route but it illustrates the fact that, sometimes, proceedings have been initiated because hospital consultants or social workers have been a little over-zealous. It is typical for the person who initiates proceedings to see the complaint through. There is a need for a separation of powers between those who take the decision to initiate an investigation and those who actually conduct it. I am worried—I will come to this a little later—about the targets for adoption and the obvious financial benefits that accrue.
	The principal problem is that social services departments cannot be entirely non-partisan in the way in which they identify the issues. Few people who initiate a serious chain of events are likely to admit it when it goes wrong. The temptation is to tailor evidence to fit the complaint. That should be resisted.
	I can give a few brief examples of how that happens. As I said, I think that I was almost certainly the first MP to go through the process of wading through a social services file concerned with a forced adoption. It was thick, repetitive and at times confusing. I have talked to the Minister about that. I speak as a former chairman of a social services department and was used to seeing that kind of thing. I was shocked at the sloppiness of record keeping, the shoddiness of the process and the basic injustice. In that file—this is directly relevant—there was misinformation, embellishment and inappropriate assigning of motives.
	I shall give just two examples, which illustrate the general problem. In the first example, the husband did not have learning difficulties but was, by mistake, described as having them. The mistake was recognised and corrected in the file but subsequently, such allegations continued to be made, as though it was a proven fact. More seriously, it was suggested that the child had witnessed domestic violence. It became clear that this was a single incident in which the husband, in a moment of pique, had picked up his slippers and thrown them against the wall. He is a gentle and passive man and at no time were the slippers aimed at anybody; nor was any damage caused, except, perhaps, for a slight mark on the wall. However, the file on that family states that the female child
	"has witnessed domestic violence and this will have an impact towards her development".
	Following close scrutiny on my part, social workers told me that there was no evidence of any violence toward either child in the family. No doctors or casualty departments had expressed concern, and there was no evidence of repeated accidents involving the children. Yet the allegation remained on the file.
	An allegation was also made of poor parenting and I asked for various examples. I was given two. First, the female child had been given sandwiches and a packet of crisps for her lunch, and because she chose to eat the crisps first, she was too full to eat her sandwiches. That was deemed sufficiently important to be regarded as an example of poor parenting. The second example—we should bear in mind that at this point, I was pressing for another such example—involved allowing one of the children to stay up late at night to watch television. I asked whether "late" meant 10 o'clock at night, or perhaps 9 o'clock. I was told that she was allowed to stay up until 8 o'clock to watch the end of "EastEnders" or "Coronation Street". I have many middle-class friends with children of a similar age who are allowed to have crisps and to stay up until 8 o'clock. None of them is subject to a care order.
	I turn to the issue of stories being embellished. By this point, the social worker was finding me a tad provocative. He said that the mother had screwed up a baby-wipe tightly in her fist and had repeatedly rubbed it against the genitals of the young male child, to the extent that they were "red raw." However, the report actually said that the mother had used heavy pressure, and that the genitals were flattened and "very red". There is a world of difference between "red raw" and discoloured.
	I found distressing the way in which motives were ascribed in the report, without any obvious discipline. The father was criticised because he had refused to leave his job of some 23 years to become the full-time carer. It was said that that showed a lack of commitment. I believe that holding down a job—in his case, a humble job—for 23 years and putting bread on the table week in, week out sets a fine example to one's children. The social workers wanted the father to live off benefits. That might have been a solution, but if someone can set an example to their children by working hard, that is something to be proud of.
	I want to return to the way in which the primacy rule can be bastardised. I confess that by this time I was beginning to irritate people, although I am sure that hon. Members will find that hard to believe. I found myself being lectured by a very senior person whom I shall not name, as that would be embarrassing. He said, "We have to consider the welfare of the child. That is absolutely paramount; whatever is best for the child is what we do."
	I replied, "OK, but if that rule is applied generally, let's apply it to your children. If I arranged for them to live in the house of Mr. Bill Gates, they would get enormous intellectual stimulation—probably more than you can offer—and they would certainly enjoy much greater financial well-being." The very senior person did not seem to like that, which made me glad that I had not used my second choice of example—Michael Jackson.
	I have talked these matters through with people who really understand them. They have said, "Look, Eric, what about the guardian? The guardian is there to look after the interests of children and to be impartial in the process."
	I put that approach to various leading counsel with an interest in the matter. Although some guardians may exist who are prepared to stand up to social services departments and act as bastions of freedom, they are very hard to find. Generally speaking, guardians act as cheerleaders for social services departments. They are entirely compliant, and seem incapable of doing more than being a cheering section.
	I had the opportunity last night to speak about such problems to the Under-Secretary of State for Education and Skills, the hon. Member for Liverpool, Garston (Maria Eagle), and I shall give one example of the role of guardians. A leading counsel on these matters—who, by the nature of things, acts sometimes for the local authority and sometimes for parents—told me about one occasion when he was acting for the local authority. Just before proceedings began, people started to gather round the table. He was not paying attention to who came through the door, and was about to begin his contribution when he noticed that the guardian was sitting in the room. "What are you doing here?" he asked, to which the guardian replied, "Well, you know, I'm here as part of the team."
	That person should not have been in the room, because the guardian's presence could demonstrate partiality. The system needs to make sure that the different strands of the process can be separated.
	I was enormously surprised to find that there is no national system for the regulation or disciplining of social workers. No royal charter exists that sets out professional standards or disciplinary procedures and thus allows peer judgment to take place. The social work profession needs to address that defect. The solution does not need to be elaborate, but peer evaluation among social workers on relevant matters is important. Without that, there is enormous variation between authorities, which can be as slack as the one involved in the Climbié case, or as tough as Rochdale in the face of ridiculous accusations of satanism.
	I shall quote briefly from Andrew Scott, an admittedly newly qualified barrister who deals with these matters on a daily basis. I suspect that he may be known to some hon. Members, as he has made quite a reputation for himself. He said:
	"I don't think the public appreciates how low the threshold is. When children are taken from their parents, it is not because there is a certainty of future harm or even that, on the balance of probabilities, those children could be harmed. It is enough that there will be a possibility of future harm. If there is a 70 per cent. risk of a child being harmed and every child with that risk was taken into care then, in 100 such cases, 30 children would be taken from families where they would come to no harm. Sometimes, I wonder whether children are being protected, or whether it is social workers' careers."
	Those are wise words. There may be a temptation for local authorities, possibly because of the financial advantage, to move towards adoption when other solutions may be possible.
	Mr. Scott goes on to say:
	"There's an unspoken fear that children from poor backgrounds are being freed up for middle-class adopters."
	I would like to give an illustration which, of all the features of the case, has really chilled me. It is about the question of duty of care. In the April before the children were finally taken with a view to an enforced adoption, there was a case conference. The second child had not yet been born. The conference was considering whether to put the child on the at-risk register. The daughter was already on it. On the basis of the facts before it, the conference decided that it was not necessary to put the young boy on the register and furthermore that it was appropriate to take the young girl off it. Somebody at that conference, notably the chairman, did not like that decision. There was no change of circumstances and no other substantial incidents had taken place. Yet the same circumstances were seen as making it appropriate to put the children into care with a view to permanent adoption.
	Let me say what I think needs to be done. Those who investigate a complaint must be independent of those who initiate it and those who may in due course be called on to care for the children. A proper code of conduct for social workers is long overdue. I certainly believe that those with special learning difficulties deserve special care. We are told that in 1 per cent. of all families one partner or the other has learning difficulties. We are also told that 20 per cent. of children in care have one parent with learning difficulties. There is some dispute over the figures, but whether they are precisely right or not, they demonstrate a problem.
	The secrecy of the family courts needs to be opened up. We wait for the consultation document. I believe that there is a strong case for judgments to be published and that they can be published while retaining the anonymity of the child. I have one additional suggestion. It goes back to the Meadow case. There is a question whether the professional witnesses should be identified. If the Government take the decision that they should, I will generally support that. Once you become involved in a case you get e-mails from all over the country. Some are heartbreaking, but they all have strong emotion running through them. Very normal people sometimes become irrational. I recognise that there might be a problem obtaining witnesses if they are routinely named.
	As an absolute minimum, each professional witness should be given a unique identifying number. I think that that is important—I suspect that hon. Members understand—because we need to establish a pattern so that if we get a problem with the veracity of a witness we can have another look at them.
	We need to change the rules with regard to advice. Parents are put in the dreadful position of being unable to seek advice. They cannot talk to their county council or unitary authority; they cannot talk to friends or members of their family. Only recently could they come and talk to us. I can give examples of where there is a problem. In care or adoption proceedings it is understandable that parents want to take a fair amount of time off. Under the existing rules, parents cannot tell their employer why they are absent from work without going back to the court. Psychiatric evaluations are also often necessary in such proceedings, but people cannot make full disclosure without first going back to the court. We have to find ways to solve those problems, and I wholeheartedly endorse the Committee's recommendations for greater transparency.
	It might be slightly controversial to say so, but some cases resemble attempts to make bricks without straw. Once the facts have been established, the courts are reluctant to revisit those facts or their interpretation. However, if adoption has resulted from fraud or seriously erroneous evidence, we should have a procedure to enable that adoption to be overturned, although the period in which that could be done should be limited. In care proceedings, any carer who is accused of abuse should have an automatic entitlement to legal aid; the opportunity to instruct an expert of their choosing; a right of appeal against any findings; and legal aid for any appeal.
	I am grateful for the opportunity to raise these issues, but I wish to make one final point. I hope to be a Member of Parliament for many years to come—[Hon. Members: "Hear, hear."] Well, that is marvellous and makes me feel wonderful. However, the case I have described will haunt me, because a grave injustice has been done and the system has let those people down. Those two young people now live in my constituency in a flat that is spotlessly clean and well maintained, with a bedroom full of toys that their children will never see. The beds are made up and presents are waiting for them. While there will be an attempt to overturn the original care proceedings, everyone understands that the likelihood of reversal is not great. When the state intervenes in people's lives, we must ensure that it does so fairly. In the case that I have dealt with over the past few months, that intervention was "intervention beyond the humane."

Simon Burns: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, although I am not that much of a newcomer as I have been in the Chamber for almost an hour.
	There is a slight problem with the hon. Gentleman's use of the word "equal". When people separate and try to set up arrangements for their children, under existing law—whatever lawyers may say—it is in fact the mother who has care of the children and will decide when the father sees them. That is why many agreements are made without problem. Fathers fully understand that they cannot fight in the court for a 50–50 arrangement because the court will not give it to them.

David Kidney: I do not want to extend this discussion, but for 20 years I was a practising solicitor in the family courts and dealt with a great deal of cases that involved divorce and the care of children. My experience in those 20 years was that the two situations that the hon. Gentleman describes were very infrequently relevant factors in the cases in which I was involved.
	The law is clear, but the current systems for resolving disputes must be improved, which is what we set out to achieve with the Bill. There is clearly a need for specialist family services to provide support as part of the overall system with which I want to deal, and even for compulsory family services for some families, such as those in conflict, those with addictions and, perhaps, mental health difficulties, and certainly in cases of family violence.
	In general, in cases where disputes that involve children occur during the breakdown of a relationship between the parents, the first port of call should be mediation. We need not wait for a breakdown in communication before mediation takes place. It is a structured process, whereby a couple are helped by an impartial third party—the mediator—to negotiate their own decisions for the long-term benefit of their children.
	Research has shown that five hours of mediation can promote sustained contact and an ongoing relationship between parents and their children. A long-term study of outcomes in the USA was referred to in a briefing that we have received from National Family Mediation and which resulted in a book called, "The Truth about Children and Divorce" by Robert Emery, who says that, 12 years after the event, 30 per cent. of parents who had attended mediation were still in weekly contact with their children, as against just 7 per cent. who had been through litigation.
	Mediation should be, in the words of National Family Mediation, the routine method for resolving child contact disputes early if the family have not already reached their own agreement. I agree with the Grandparents Association that mediation should also be available to grandparents and other relatives who have been involved in children's care.
	I asked a question earlier about the funding of mediation, because that is relevant if there are barriers to something that could be successful and save costs downstream. Publicly funded solicitors' clients are required to consider mediation unless it is unsafe—for example, because of an allegation of domestic violence—before they can go on to receive further legal help with their court cases. In the past, they may have received legal aid. For those clients, mediation is free. No contribution is required from them, and there is no suggestion of a statutory charge being placed on their property after the case has finished.

Andrew Selous: I am sorry to hear that. The onus is on local community family trusts to try to raise as much money as they can. Some of the central support for the work of community family trusts has been cut and I hope that today's debate will enable Ministers to review some of those decisions. As the hon. Member for Stafford and others said, it is right that the focus should be on mediation, avoiding cases going to court in the first place and early intervention.
	I, too, have examined the situation in Florida, which is also mentioned in the Department for Education and Skills publication, "Children's needs, parents' responsibilities":
	"Schemes to divert parents away from court have been developing, including the scheme led by Judge John Lendeman in Florida whereby parents are given information about the damaging impact of their conflict on their children and invited to work out a parenting plan with the help of a mediator. Other programmes are being developed to help and support parents by teaching about their new roles as collaborative mothers and fathers after separation."
	We should be going in that direction in the United Kingdom, and I share the concerns expressed by the hon. Member for Stafford that the Bill does not explicitly state how we can do so and whether sufficient funds are available.
	Clause 4 deals with the enforcement of court orders, which remains an area of great concern to me. Over the past four and a half years, several constituents have come to me to complain about this. Typically, they are good, concerned fathers who regularly pay their child support as they should, month by month. Some of them have been back to the court 30 or 40 times to try to get their disputes resolved and to have enforced the contact that they have been granted by the court after it has weighed up all the considerations. They have come to me and said that neither the court nor the police have been interested in ensuring that the contact that they were granted is enforced.
	That was graphically illustrated to me in my constituency surgery about two weeks ago, when a serving company sergeant-major came to see me. He sat down in front of me and took off the fleece that he was wearing, and right in the middle of his chest was the symbol of his office as a warrant officer in the Army—a large crown. He said, "I don't believe in the antics of Fathers 4 Justice"—who, it is worth remembering, have physically changed the shape of this Chamber since we last debated these issues. He went on, "I stand for what this country stands for. I am a serving soldier and I have done everything right. I pay all the money that I am required to. I have a court order that has stamped on it the same crown that I wear as the badge of my office, yet it is not worth the paper it is written on in terms of my ability to see my children." That is an absolutely scandalous state of affairs for a good, caring father who has every right to see his children, and whose children will be missing out on the input of a good and dedicated father. The tragedy is that the gentleman who came to see me is one of 7,000 non-resident parents every year who find that the court orders that have been granted to enable them to see their children are being breached.
	My worry is that it is not sufficiently clear exactly what will happen if these contact orders continue to be breached. When I intervened on the Minister during her opening speech, she said, properly, that the matter would be left to the courts. However, as Members of Parliament, we collectively represent the High Court of Parliament. It is important that we make it absolutely clear that, where people have acted properly, the court has duly considered all the information, the non-resident father clearly has no history of domestic violence or anything similar, and the court has said that contact must happen, that contact is in the best interests of the child and we must ensure as a Parliament that it happens. That is fundamental.
	If the constituent whom I spoke about, or any other such constituent, comes back to see me after the Bill has passed into law, I will feel that I have failed him if the contact that the court has said that he should have with his children, and his children with him, is not being granted. I am sure that the Minister understands the seriousness of this. We have to ensure that the law has teeth and that where contact has been ordered it really does happen.
	The difficulty will centre on what series of escalating steps—my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham mentioned this—is put in place by the courts to bring that about. It is clearly sensible to have parenting intervention programmes to try to convince parents to do the right thing. I like the idea of giving compensatory time. We could also consider fines going from one parent to the other so that the child does not lose out, with perhaps some mechanism to ensure that that money is indeed spent on the child. It is a vital issue. Many non-resident parents—often fathers—give up their house and the day-to-day care of their children. In many cases, another man moves into their house and lives with their children for most of the time. If the one thing that they have been given—a right by a court to see their children—is flouted, it is a massive injustice for the children and the non-resident parents.
	I echo all the points that have been made about grandparents, but why confine the comments to grandparents? Uncles, aunts, cousins and the extended family generally are vital for the development of our nation's children. Many of us have benefited from close relationships with all members of our extended family. Our view of the family is much too nuclear in this country and in several European countries. We could greatly benefit from a more southern European approach. Contact and enforcement is important not only for the non-resident parent but for all those who have loved and cared for children. For many grandparents, uncles and aunts, the children whom they will not see have been an incredibly important part of their lives. We must ensure that the matter is taken seriously for their sake, too.
	I want to raise a practical point. We cannot legislate for it, so it properly does not appear in the Bill, but it concerns me and I should like to consider it. When non- resident parents travel some way from their homes to see their children, there may not be a contact centre in which to see them. Supervised visits have to take place in a contact centre, but if the visits are unsupervised and there is no contact centre, where do they go? There is an expression, "McDads". In the summer, it may not be so bad—perhaps there is a park or another place outside on a warm day—but where, physically, do we expect non-resident parents to spend any quality time with their children? I am not looking for state provision from the Minister but I am trying to think of solutions.
	Perhaps charities can help. We have heard much about children's charities today. Perhaps the NSPCC or other charities that have been slightly criticised may like to consider the problem. Perhaps churches, faith groups or anyone in a community who has space in their home and a heart for such matters could help. Perhaps arrangements could be made to put non-resident parents and their children with people who would like to open their homes to them. The non-resident parents could relax and play with their children in a familiar, family environment. That would have to be done by agreement and negotiation, but it is an important matter that some of my constituents who are non-resident parents—and non-resident grandparents—who have to travel some way have raised with me. I do not look to the Government for an answer—it is properly not within their remit—so Ministers can relax. However, I hope that they at least agree that it is an important matter to consider in the context of the care of children with non-resident parents.
	Other hon. Members have mentioned delay. "Justice delayed is justice denied" is a common saying about the law. That is nowhere more true than when children are involved. Childhood is finite and crucial. If a parent misses specific stages of a child's development, they are gone for ever. That is a tragedy. Speed is therefore important. Of course, we must get things right but speed is also vital and I hope that that will be taken fully into account.

Maria Eagle: No doubt it is but that is not a matter for me to decide.
	I congratulate hon. Members on both sides of the House who have participated in an extremely stimulating, wide-ranging and well-argued debate. It is apparent from their speeches that they approach the issue with a passionate commitment to try to ensure that children caught up in the divorce or separation of couples, and the bitterness that sometimes results, are not harmed too much by that experience. There is no doubt that that commitment was apparent even if it was also apparent that there may be one or two slightly different approaches to how best to achieve that. That is no different from the tone adopted when the Bill was debated in another place and during later proceedings on it. The hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole (Annette Brooke) was right to say that proceedings on the Bill have been going on for some time. That lengthy deliberation is only correct because we need to get things right; the future of the children whom we are trying to assist depends on our doing so.
	The debate did occasionally descend into slightly bad temper and we had a couple of somewhat vehement spats between the hon. Members for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) and for Mid-Dorset and North Poole. There was also a spat involving the hon. Gentleman and the NSPCC, which was of course unable to defend itself. However, it will doubtless find an opportunity to do so when the debate is over.
	I want to sort out what I believe to have been a genuine misunderstanding—it does not happen very often—between the usual channels. The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham suggested that the Government are trying to avoid giving the Opposition the time that they want for consideration in Committee, but I assure him that that is not the case. There has been a genuine misunderstanding, in that the usual channels on our side gave what was asked for, but I assure him that the Government intend to be flexible and to provide more time in Committee if required.
	I shall deal with some of the points and broad themes that were raised, although I will not have time to deal with them all, given that most Members spoke at great length. It is clear that contact with both parents is in the interests of the child if it can be done in safety; indeed, there is general agreement in all parts of the House on that point. I would argue—as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Redcar (Vera Baird) argued, perhaps more eloquently than I ever could—that case law already suggests that the courts start from the position that contact between a child and their parents is generally in the child's best interests.
	The different perspectives expressed on the Floor of the House disagreed on the question whether such contact compromises the safety of the child in some instances, or the paramount interest of the child's welfare, given that such contact often breaks down. The Children Act 1989 does of course contain the paramountcy principle, and the Government and I believe it incredibly important that that principle, which was established with the support of Members in all parts of the House, be retained. We heard from my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Redcar an excellent exposition on what changing the presumptions would mean in legal terms. It is undoubtedly true that many fathers are unable to spend the time with their children that they would like to spend, and it is right that we offer them support and encourage a positive relationship between children and both parents after separation. The Bill attempts to ensure that we do just that by providing the courts with more flexibility in enforcing contacts that they have ordered, on the basis that they are in the interest of the child. That is what the Bill is about.
	However, we need to be clear that any presumption—even if couched as a principle in the absence of evidence to the contrary—represents a different legal model from the one enshrined in the 1989 Act. To place something else on a level with that which is supposed to constitute paramountcy is incompatible with the paramountcy principle. I am certain that we will continue to have legalistic and non-legalistic arguments on this issue—from lawyers and non-lawyers—as the Bill proceeds through the House, but the Government do not want to do anything to compromise the paramountcy principle.
	In the main, Members in all parts of the House had something positive to say about mediation. The issue was raised of whether voluntary mediation is best, or whether mediation could—or even should—be compulsory. It is clear that voluntary mediation is best: one can lead a horse to water, but one cannot make it drink. Can we really expect people to be forced to mediate if they are not in the mood? Requiring mediation before a case can proceed, for example, could simply result in further unnecessary delay if the parties are already well-entrenched in their respective positions and are in no fit state to see that mediation might actually help. However, the Joint Committee considering the draft Bill recommended that the court should be able to direct people to attend an initial meeting with a mediator, and I think that that would be appropriate.
	The hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole asked whether information about mediation was available other than in the form of leaflets. She asked whether a video was available, and I can tell her that the Government are even more modern than that, having produced a DVD on the subject. We are moving into the modern world, and the courts will have to do the same.
	The hon. Member for Basingstoke said that some 40 per cent. of non-resident parents lose contact with their children within two years of separation. I have heard that figure before, but I am not sure of its provenance. I hope that the hon. Lady will be able to let me know, perhaps during the Committee stage. However, the omnibus survey by the Office for National Statistics suggests that about three quarters of non-resident parents who have been separated for between two and three years have contact with their children at least once a week, and that fewer than 10 per cent. of them have no contact at all. In respect of longer separations, the survey suggests that about 20 per cent. of children have no contact with a non-resident parent after two years. That is still far too many, but it is fewer than the hon. Lady suggested, and we might have to return to the matter in Committee.
	I am glad that hon. Members on all sides of the House mentioned the positive role played by grandparents and other members of the extended family. I agree completely with that, and note that the Bill can apply not only to resident or non-resident parents but to grandparents as well. It is not restricted to parents, so I hope that it will assist in all of these matters.
	The question of resources for CAFCASS and the courts was raised. I can understand that, but the Government have always made it clear that they should have adequate funding so that they can fulfil their responsibilities under part 1 of the Bill. My right hon. Friend the former Minister for Children, who is now Minister for Employment and Welfare Reform, said as much in evidence to the Joint Committee. She stressed that the Bill's provisions will be implemented only when we are satisfied that appropriate resources are available.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Mr. Kidney) and the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) both spoke about how the work loads of the family courts and of CAFCASS could be reduced. We have high hopes that the Bill will enable us to shift resources from too much reporting writing to more proactive and helpful interventions. I know that CAFCASS is very committed to ensuring that that happens.
	The hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles) was extremely ingenious in managing to talk about public law and domestic adoption in connection with a Bill that deals with private law and inter-country adoption. I congratulate him on that, and I am, of course, aware of the case that he raised. I would take an extremely dim view if any local authority sought to remove children from parents simply because they were learning disabled. Some of the legislation for which I had the honour to be responsible in the previous Parliament will come into force in December, and make it even more difficult for public authorities to behave in that way than is currently the case. There is an increased awareness of these matters, and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will continue the campaigns on behalf of his constituents for which he is known.
	In conclusion, it is clear that we will have a lot more to say in Committee. We might even have a little more time in which to say it, given the accidental error in the programme motion that meant that only four sittings were originally provided for. I look forward to that discussion, as I believe that hon. Members of all parties have a genuine interest in making things better for the children of divorcing and separating couples.
	That is certainly true of the Government. If every child in this country is to matter, we must make sure that those whose families separate do not suffer the consequences—that is, lack of development and self-esteem, and an inability to do their very best in future life. We are all in favour of that, and I commend the Bill to the House.
	Question put and agreed to.
	Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Edward Vaizey: What was just said was not meaningless verbiage—it was a very important procedural point of the House—but to return to the meaningless verbiage to which I was referring from the Department of Health, it is effectively passing the buck. Partly because I am currently a member of the armed forces parliamentary scheme and have recently been attached to the Royal Marines, the analogy occurred to me that allowing a local mental health trust to decide the fate of the Park would be a bit like asking Devon county council to decide the fate the Royal Marines.
	Although I believe in local commissioning and local accountability, at some point the Government must recognise where they have a national resource that must have national backing. For example, a local primary care trust will admit a child to an in-patient unit less than once a year on average. So why on earth would a local mental health trust be charged solely with the responsibility for the Park? When the local mental health trust writes that the trust
	"is not able to continue to host tier 4 in-patient services for children under 11 as the future withdrawal of local contracts leaves us without any secure income",
	it is saying that it has been left holding the baby. Given that situation, it is further saying that it is going to sell the cot—the land on which the hospital stands.
	Since it became more widely known that I would hold this Adjournment debate, things have moved somewhat. I was told this week by the mental health trust that
	"for the foreseeable future, services will remain at the Park and we are in discussion with the PCTs about how the services will look in future and where in-patient facilities will be available".
	Again, I am not at all sure what that means. Certainly, the people whom I have been speaking to do not believe that the Park has been saved from closure. Certainly, the mental health community believes that the Park will close. Has there been a failure of communication or a failure of consultation? How long is the foreseeable future? Where will in-patient services be available? Until the recent crisis, the intention had always been to close the Park, but to reopen a new in-patient facility.
	The Government seem to be refusing to take responsibility for a national service. That is why I have chosen to raise this subject at a national level, in the House this evening. Managers, removed from the clinical chalk face, push through changes—or perhaps they are forced to push them through—that the professionals counsel against, whether in respect of special needs education or specialist clinical services, such as child psychiatry.
	This, though, is not, and should not be, a matter for party politics. It is genuinely an issue of national concern, and if we do not act, it will be a matter of national shame. The Park, and other units, shine as beacons of national excellence throughout the world. Moreover, they shine as beacons of hope for many vulnerable and disadvantaged children and their families. With little notice and even less justification, those beacons are being snuffed out one by one.
	As my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Angela Browning) reminded the House, that will mean longer journey times for children and their families; more time spent apart; the inappropriate use of adolescent and even adult services for children; a greater cost to the community, because of the need to provide longer-term treatment; and the loss of a specialist service built up over many years.
	As a House, we cannot sit idly by and let that happen. I am sure that the Minister, who has listened very carefully to what I have said this evening, will not let it happen. I know that, tonight, the Minister will say that the Park must be saved and that we must retain and enhance the national specialist child psychiatry services that we still just have in this country.